If two points define a line, three may suggest a trend –– and on Salt Spring Island, one foundation’s latest analysis found the hourly wage needed to cover living expenses is yet again moving higher.
A spike in the region’s cost of living has pushed that number to $26.25 per hour, according to Salt Spring’s 2024 Living Wage report from the Salt Spring Island Foundation (SSIF) –– a 7.75 per cent increase from 2022 mostly driven by housing costs, according to the report.
The 2024 report is the latest from the foundation, which periodically crunches the numbers in cooperation with the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives and Living Wage BC. In 2022, the figure was $24.36 and in 2018 it was $20.95.
As in previous years, the wage figure is built from a set of assumptions around a hypothetical family on Salt Spring Island –– comprised of two adults working full-time, and two children aged four and seven.
The living wage is expected to cover basic expenses, including rental housing, food, transportation and –– with those two children –– childcare. That last expense is an increasingly difficult challenge among many, according to SSIF executive director Shannon Cowan, and despite financial relief provided by government measures like subsidies and income-tested benefits, it’s a race many island families are losing.
“There’s a substantial gap between the amount of available subsidized childcare spaces and the number of children needing care on Salt Spring,” said Cowan.
“Government childcare subsidies have greatly reduced the cost of care, but unfortunately for only a fraction of the families who have accessed those licensed care spots.”
The “shelter and communications” portion of costs has increased 36 per cent since the 2022 report, an equivalent of almost $900 more per month in rent for a suitable home for the hypothetical four-person family. That data has been gathered courtesy Salt Spring Solutions, the foundation said, which shared results from its recent Point in Time Housing Count surveys.
Some figures, like the cost of essential clothes for a family of four or a modest amount of parent education, were sourced from places like Statistics Canada and Camosun College. And for others, foundation researchers did what the hypothetical family of four might: they asked. For example, they gathered a variety of cell phone and internet quotes from providers that offer Salt Spring service –– and took the most affordable from each.
Even as B.C.’s current minimum wage has risen –– to $17.40 per hour –– the gap between it and the living wage has persisted, according to Anastasia French, provincial manager for Living Wage BC.
“Hundreds of thousands of B.C. workers earn less than the living wage,” said French, “and face impossible choices like buying groceries or heating the house, keeping up with bills or paying the rent on time.”
In a region where the cost of living keeps climbing, French said, racialized workers and women are disproportionately affected by low wages –– and for those not part of a family or group that can pool resources, it’s likely even more difficult.
“Some preliminary estimates we have produced suggest that the living wage may not be sufficient to support single parents and single people on Salt Spring Island,” said French. “In other communities this is not the case, and we want to explore this in more detail in the future.”
And the living wage, Cowan said, is just the basics –– a “decent but modest” standard of living without many of the extras we might take for granted.
“It does not cover credit card, loan or other debt payments,” said Cowan, “savings for retirement or for children’s future education –– or the costs of caring for a disabled, seriously ill or elderly family member.”
To read the full report, see ssifoundation.ca/foundation-initiatives/living-wage-2024.